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Thursday, December 30, 2010

Rangers 3, Devils 1: Wrapping up

By their own admission - and from watching with our own eyes - this was clearly not the Rangers’ finest moment this season. Too many defensive lapses and not a high enough battle level, particularly in the first period but also in the second period as both teams gave away chances. But the game is an overall positive because of the way the Rangers finally began to clamp down in the third period.

Perhaps Marc Staal is the best microcosm of the Rangers’ game. On Mattias Tedenby’s near breakaway goal - most likely the save of the night by Henrik Lundqvist as he makes a season-high 43 and was a clear-cut first star - coach John Tortorella admits he has no idea what Staal was thinking on the ice as Tedenby split through to get to the net. However, Tortorella said Staal was “an animal” in the third period, particularly as the Rangers killed off two Devils’ power plays while clinging to a one-goal lead.

“You can tell they’re lacking confidence a little bit to score goals,” Lundqvist said of the Devils. “They’re creating chances.”

Tedenby had a team-high five shots for the Devils while Ilya Kovalchuk had four. Brian Boyle had a game-high six shots to go with a game-high seven shots. The always-affable Boyle was in a particularly good mood after the game as he scored his 14th goal of the season. Turns out it’s his father Artie’s birthday and his father specifically asked his son to score a goal as a present. Now that’s a good son.
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Tortorella was not surprised the Rangers became more dominant in the third period - the Devils had eight shots over the final 20 minutes despite the two power plays after getting 16 and 20 in the first two periods, respectively.

And while new/old/interim Devils coach Jacques Lemaire is harping on how his team is not in proper game condition, Tortorella said that played a key factor for the Rangers.

“It’s conditioning,” Tortorella said of the third period. “These guys have done their work and not so much during camp, it’s in the offseason as they prepare for camp. The overall conditioning level our team was good. You get a mentality, I think it’s grown on our club, this is our period, this is when we’re going to do our thing.”

As for the changing lines in the second period - Tortorella eventually settled with Gaborik playing with Derek Stepan and Brandon Dubinsky, Tortorella said it wasn’t necessarily an indictment of how Mats Zuccarello played to start on that line.

“I just wanted to change the lines to see if something else would happened,” Tortorella said. “With Zuc, it was one of those games where I didn’t feel comfortable putting him in some spots. I thought Sean (Avery) gave us some good minutes wanted to bump him up.”

Here are the Rangers’ post-game notes:
* The Rangers defeated the New Jersey Devils, 3-1, tonight at Prudential Center to improve to 22-14-2 overall, including a 13-6-0 mark on the road. New York has registered a point in 16 of their last 23 games, posting a record of 15-7-1 over the span, and now lead the league with 13 road wins.
* Henrik Lundqvist stopped a season-high, 43 shots, including all 20 shots faced in the second period, improving to 16-12-2 overall, including a 11-6-0 mark on the road. He is now 8-4-1 with a 1.83 goals against average, a .932 save percentage and three shutouts in his last 14 games, and is tied for the league lead with 11 road wins. Lundqvist is now 21-7-5 with a 1.80 goals against average in 33 career regular season games vs. the Devils, and improved to 19-4-5 with a 1.69 goals against average and .939 save percentage in 28 career regular season games against Martin Brodeur.
* Brandon Dubinsky registered two points, including the primary assist on the game-winning goal and an empty net goal, and posted a plus-two rating. He has now recorded points in each of the last three games (two goals, three assists), and has tallied 12 points (four goals, eight assists) in the last 12 contests.
* Michal Rozsival notched the game-winning goal and tied for the game-high with two blocked shots. He has now recorded six points (one goal, five assists) in the last nine games.
* Brian Boyle tallied the Rangers’ first goal at 7:18 of the first period, responding to a Devil’s goal just 47 seconds earlier, and registered game-highs with six shots, seven hits and 13 faceoff wins in 20 attempts (65%). Boyle extended his scoring streak to three games (two goals, three assists over the span), and has now registered 11 points (four goals, seven assists) in the last 11 games.
* Derek Stepan extended his scoring streak to five games (four goals, two assists) with an assist on the game-winning goal, and has now recorded 18 points (eight goals, 10 assists) in the last 22 contests.
* Ruslan Fedotenko recorded the primary assist on Brian Boyle’s goal at 7:18 of the first period, and registered four shots on goal. He has tallied a point in each of the last three games (two goals, one assist), and four of the last five (two goals, two assists).
* Artem Anisimov extended his assist streak to three games (three assists) with an assist on Brandon Dubinsky’s empty net goal, and has now registered six points (two goals, four assists) in the last seven games.
* Brandon Prust registered one assist in 18:31 of ice time and has now recorded eight points (four goals, four assists) in the last 12 games, including an assist in each of the last two contests.
* After an off-day tomorrow, the Blueshirts’ next practice is scheduled for 2:00 p.m. on Friday, Dec. 31, at St. Pete Times Forum in Tampa Bay, Florida.
* The Rangers will return to action when they face-off against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday, Jan. 1, at St. Pete Times Forum (7:30 p.m.), to begin a back-to-back set. The game will be televised live on MSG Network and can be heard on 1050 ESPN Radio and newyorkrangers.com.
* New York Rangers President and General Manager Glen Sather announced tonight that forward Dale Weise has been recalled from the Connecticut Whale of the American Hockey League (AHL). Weise, 22, has registered seven goals and five assists for 12 points, along with 29 penalty minutes in 16 games with the Whale this season. He ranks fourth on the team in goals, and is tied for third on the Whale with four power play goals despite missing 18 games due to injury this season. Weise made his NHL debut on December 18, and was assessed a fighting major in a 4-1 loss at Philadelphia.

Posted by Andrew Gross on 12/30 at 06:37 AM

i asked this question in the last thread but i’ll ask it here.. how’d Zuc play tonight? i had to miss the game

Posted by Nick on 12/30 at 08:25 AM

zuc did ok, not a lot of time down the stretch. 1 nice scoring oppty. in the first period but overall the rangers were outplayed by a lot.

bad goal on boyles shot and a lucky deflection on the roszi goal.. They stole 2 points which is what good teams do on occassion.

Posted by stuart a on 12/30 at 08:52 AM

the scary thing about MZA and Torts feels it too is when he is in our own end. When MZA doesn’t have the puck and he’s in our own end he looks like a peewee player playing with grown ups. Totally out of his element. I’m glad Torts moved him and as a result received less playing time. Of course when he is in the other team’s zone. Of you have a feeling something good is going to happen. He just needs experience.

Posted by NYRfan16 on 12/30 at 09:08 AM

Andrew - Has the entire team been fitted with the extra padding on the gloves that Drury got when he returned? They had a shot of Dru on the bench and you can see the extra padding. But I also noticed it on every other player they showed up close. Just curious…

It was good to see them grind this one out. But the Devils also miseed 3 wide open nets, so they could have stolen this game had they gotten a few bounces.

About

ANDREW GROSS covers the New York Rangers for The Record and Herald News, having joined the North Jersey Media Group in November 2007. Gross also covered the Rangers and New York Jets, as well as St. John’s basketball and Army football, for Gannett Newspapers and The Journal News (N.Y.). He graduated from Syracuse University in 1989 with a degree in newspaper journalism.